Aaron Paul’s ‘Need for Speed’ Looks Crazy, But Maybe Not Crazy Enough

After making a show as revelatory as Breaking Bad, sometimes you need to take on something a couple of steps down on the prestige scale. Something that embraces film’s basest pleasures, like a movie about cars driving really fast. Paul hits the throttle hard in the newest trailer for Need for Speed.

The trailer gets us up to speed on the troubles of Tobey Marshall, a racer who is wrongly imprisoned for his friend’s death and vows to get revenge against his rival the only way he know how: by driving really, really fast. Rapper Kid-Cudi and Dominic Cooper are along for the ride, but the standout is Michael Keaton, who spouts grandiose lines about motor oil and vehicular vengeance like some sort of grease monkey poet laureate.

NeedforSpeed/YouTube

So far, the film looks like Fast & Furious-lite. It’s willing to flirt with the absurdidy of that other “cars go really fast” franchise, but not willing to fully commit to the depths of that series’ craziness… craziness that sometimes feels just a hair away from a Speed Racer cartoon. In any case, this film should give you a small dose of adrenaline before Fast & The Furious series turns the corner to give you the full shot next summer.